Close encounters of the lizard kind

April 2023

Southern Spain is on fire, literally. The first heatwave of the year has Andalusia in a sizzling grip, and the mercury is flirting shamesly with 40°. Most sane people would head straight for a pool or the nearest ice-cold cerveza. Not Jasper. No, Jasper decides this is the perfect moment to hop on the bikes and tackle the Via Verde de la Sierra.

Why? Well, this old railway line turned  cycling route, has about thirthy tunnels. And tunnels mean shade. And shade means survival. At least, that’s the theory. So off we go, cruising at a leisurely pace through the rolling hills and endless views.The rhythm is calm, the scenery georgeous – until we get company.

Out of nowhere, something scurries across the path. Not a bunny. Not a squirel. A lizard.

And not just any lizard. Forget the tiny geckos that hang around terrace walls at night. This beast is nearly a meter long. With its imposing head and striking green scales, the reptile bolts ahead of us like it owns the trail. Naturally, Google comes to the rescue: we’ve just had a face-off with an Ocellated Lizard (Lagarto Ocelado), the heavyweight champion of European reptiles. Impressive? Absolutely. Delicious? Well, according to Wikipedia, the Spanish think so. Apparantly, it’s considered a delicacy.

Excuse me? Clearly, whoever wrote that hasn’t spent much time in Spain. Yes, Spaniards eat snails, frogs, sea urchins and even goose barnacles.

Those strange things clinging to Atlantic rocks. But if you sit down in a restaurant today and spot Lagarto Ibérico on the menu… relax. You’re not about to chew on a lizard tail. What you’ll actually get is a juicy cut of Iberian pork, carved from the strip between ribs and loin. Because of its long, slender shape, it earned the name lagarto. Marketing genius, right?

And as for real lizard on the plate? A certain Luis Antonio de Vega went on a culinary road trip through Spain back in the late 1960s and found only one region – Extremadura – where anyone actually cooked it. So unless you’ve got a time machine and a taste for the extreme, your Andalusian bike ride is safe from reptilian recipes.